David Sand, an assistant professor in the Department of Physics, received $538,039 for his project “Unveiling the Physics and Progenitors of Cosmic Explosions with a One Day Cadence
Supernova Search.”

“The goal is to find supernovae, which are stars that explode at the end of their
life, very young – within a day of when they exploded – so we can trace back and understand
what type of star exploded,” Sand said. “There’s a whole zoo of different types of
supernovae and we don’t have a clear mapping of what stars become what supernovae.”

Sand and his students will focus on 400 galaxies per night, hoping to find 10 supernovae
each year. By intensively studying the supernovae as soon as possible after the explosion,
the team hopes to measure the temperature and chemical abundance of the explosion
with time and ultimately measure the radius of the star that exploded. The award started
Sept. 15 and is expected to run through August 2018.

“Millions of people suffer from major chronic diseases such as cancers, diabetes,
cardiovascular and infectious disease,” Kim said. “To improve survival rates of patients
and give the right treatment at the right time, early diagnosis of these diseases
from a simple blood test is critical. Current blood screening methods have significant
limitations: large sample volume, lengthy testing time, expensive fluorescence tagging
and an inability to test for many target molecules simultaneously.

“In this research project, we will demonstrate a novel optical cavity biosensor that
is integrated with a simple microfluidic device to detect the concentration of target
molecules. This integrated device enables automated, low-cost and ultra-sensitive
biomolecule detection. Such rapid, simple and cost-effective ultra-sensitive biosensors
have huge potential to make a significant impact on various clinical and healthcare
applications.”

The project is a collaboration with Seunghyun Kim, an associate professor of electrical
engineering at LeTourneau University in Longview. The award started Sept. 1 and is
expected to run through August 2018.

“Over 50 percent of all human infectious diseases are zoonotic or originate through
the cross-species transmission of viruses from wildlife to humans,” Allen said. “Included
among these are hantaviruses, which pose a significant threat to public health worldwide
and are classified as emerging infectious diseases. Hantaviruses are transmitted to
humans through contact with infected rodent excrement. Although hantaviruses cause
little morbidity or mortality in their rodent reservoir, they establish a persistent
infection that spills over into sympatric or human hosts. Spillover infection in nonreservoir
rodents results in an asymptomatic acute infection without any apparent proinflammatory
response or disease, whereas spillover in humans results in severe pathology (hantavirus
cardiopulmonary syndrome) with mortality reaching 40-50 percent.

Alex Trindade

“Very little is known regarding the differences in the innate/adaptive immune response
to hantavirus infection that characterize these three distinct responses: persistence,
viral clearance or severe pathology. The primary goals of this research are to formulate
and test new mathematical models based on carefully designed in vitro experiments
for hantavirus infection and to identify key immune components at crucial time points
that differentiate between natural versus nonnatural reservoirs (rodents and humans).
This knowledge is essential for designing interventions and therapeutics for treatment
of hantaviruses and other similar zoonotic viruses for which treatment is not currently
available.”

The project is in collaboration with Colleen Jonsson, a professor of microbiology
at the University of Tennessee, and Michele Kosiewicz, an associate professor of microbiology
and immunology at the University of Louisville. The award started Sept. 15 and is
expected to run through August 2018.

Comprised of 15 departments, the College offers a wide variety of courses and programs
in the humanities, social and behavioral sciences, mathematics and natural sciences.
Students can choose from 41 bachelor’s degree programs, 34 master’s degrees and 14
doctoral programs.

With over 10,000 students (8,500 undergraduate and 1,200 graduate) enrolled, the College
of Arts & Sciences is the largest college on the Texas Tech University campus.

The Office of the Vice President for Research is dedicated to developing new technologies for a better world. From the study of
the smallest nanoparticles to comprehensive wind power systems, from research in autism
and addiction, to our pioneering work in STEM education, our researchers are finding
ways to solve problems, improve lives and find new solutions to the world’s critical
needs.